What is Screen Printing?

To get better custom apparel, it is crucial to know the terminology for creating your custom clothes. Suppose you are starting your custom clothing store. Promoting your brand. Creating uniforms for your company. Creating an awesome t-shirt for your event or creating cool music band t-shirts. In that case, knowing which printing method will serve you well is better. In this post, we'll define Screen Printing, an excellent decoration method for printing on t-shirts, hoodies, tank tops, pants, shorts, totes, etc.

Screen printing is the process of forcing ink through a stencil. It is quite the oldest form of printing, except now we have the added benefit of computer-generated art and detailed stencils. First, we separate your art into separate colours. Then, we make a different screen for each colour in your design. We load each of those onto a printing press, fill the screen with ink, and then push the ink through the stencil with a squeegee. We can make detailed prints by stacking up different ink colours and blending them on the t-shirt. Once the shirt is printed, it goes on a conveyor dryer and goes on a trip through an oven. When the shirt gets to 320 degrees Fahrenheit, the ink is cured and is permanent. Many different types of ink can be used in screen printing. Here is a list of techniques we offer:

Screen printing on t-shirts is the most common way to get an image on a t-shirt. This is because it is durable, and the process lends itself well to heavy and rugged inks that wash well and hold up to flexing and bending with a garment. Think about it. What other printing application is expected to hold up well after being washed one hundred times? Screen printing can do that.

We can screen print almost anything on a t-shirt. Simple logos or photographic images can be created using layering of inks and blending of colours on a t-shirt. But remember the more colours in your image, the more it costs you to print it. In the case of screen printing, the old saying 'less is more' generally applies.

We can screen print logos on all kinds of garments. Sweatshirts are a smart option. When screen printing a sweatshirt, be careful not to expect incredible detail – for example...a photograph of your uncle. That's not going to screen print well on a sweatshirt. Screen printing on a sweatshirt is best with blocks of colours, not colour bleeds or half-tone dots. I'm not saying it's impossible to print a photo of your uncle on a sweatshirt. Still, it's a complicated process that is quite involved and looks better on t-shirts than sweatshirts. The reason for this is the thickness of the fabric. The thicker the material, the more likely those tiny dots of detail squish out under the pressure of the squeegee against the thick, soft sweatshirt and detail gets lost.

If you plan your art to be simple and only a few colours, you will probably be the happiest with the results on a hoodie or a crew-neck sweatshirt. You can do some pretty great art with one or two colours. And - the fewer colours, the less you will pay.

Screen Printing is a time-tested way to print images onto garments of all types. At GetBold, we have been doing it for over two decades with many happy customers. Send you screen printing needs to GetBold, and you will be pleased with the results.